4 Must Do’s to Build a High Performing Team
The goal of every manager should be to build a high performing team or at least a higher performing team. This is what the company needs to be successful which translates into what the manager needs to achieve to also be successful. Being able to consistently create a high performing team or significantly improve the performance of a team you given to manage is an incredibly valuable ability to develop. Gaining this ability will literally underpin a very successful career managing and leading teams.
A high performing team will deliver multiple times the value to a business compared to an average team. The difference to the business is huge – into hundreds of thousands even for small teams. 80% of the value in a business is probably delivered by the top 20% of teams.
4 Must Do’s to Build a High Performing Team
- Be there for your team
- Make it super clear what you expect from your team
- Celebrate the differences
- Work on building a “best work” environment
Very importantly, the managers that do consistently deliver amazing team performance have been taught what they need to do to create a high performing team. Early in my career, I was an okay manager, nothing more. I was then mentored and coached by my best boss ever. As a result of what she taught me and some hard work on my part, I learnt how to build a high performing team and I have gone on to massively improve performance in multiple teams in different companies. I have won best team prizes at national and company level, again, with different teams.
There is a lot that goes into creating a high performing team. Today we are covering four of the most important management elements to use to improve the performance of any team you manage.
Even better is that all of these are within your control as a manager, no matter what company you work in.
Watch on YouTube
Listen on Podcast
Be There For Your Team – The first crucial element to build a high performing team
I personally think being there for your team is the most important thing you can do as a manager. A manager’s purpose is to improve what the team produces. Team performance is what you are being assessed on. Go all in to be there for your team and they will be there for you.
Your team members need to know and feel you are absolutely there for them, that you have their back.
How To Show You Care
In practical terms, to demonstrate this day in day out, you should be:
- Setting as clear and realistic direction and expectations as you can so everyone in the team knows what is expected from them and can work towards meeting and beating their goals, and do so in a supportive way to the whole team
- Spending your time proactively looking for and solving problems that stop the team doing their work, that cause delays, that damage standards, or that impact the relationships and culture of the team
- Proactively working to develop the skills, experience and careers of your team, especially where these are aligned with what the company needs
- Regularly provide honest timely feedback – positive and corrective – with empathy and consideration and with the aim of helping the other person do their best
- Fight to protect your team, where appropriate, from politics, from low value requests and activities and other issues that suck up time, effort and energy within the team
- You should use the power of your position carefully – always in service of the team and not for your benefit at the expense of others
- Lastly, manage yourself well – your decisions, actions and behaviours – to reinforce and live the expectations you have set the team and to develop trust and the culture of the team. Where you lead, culturally & behaviourally, your team will follow.
Being there for the team does not mean putting relationships before results, being soft and fuzzy, avoiding making the tough decisions or avoiding tackling difficult problems. Being a great manager is maintaining a careful balancing act between many conflicting demands and requirements placed on your team.
Be there for your team every day!
make it super clear what you expect from your team to increase team performance
Nearly every text book, video and course on good team management talks about setting goals and expectations clearly. Most managers in my experience are only okay at setting direction and expectations. They send their team mixed messages which results in team member confusion, uncertainty, wasted effort & resources, being overly protective, slower progress and less being delivered. This results in average or worse team performance.
A Couple of Examples
- A manager gives their team an important goal to reach then spends more time working on and talking about two different activities.
- The manager expects the team to hit all the deadlines set but the manager rarely delivers on time with help they have committed to providing to the team
- The team’s manager expects the team to finish a project before starting the next, yet the manager regularly gets diverted to the latest request from their boss, leaving unfinished work behind
There can be good business reasons behind these situations developing. More often than not, it is because of human nature.
To set really clear direction and expectations, the manager must live that direction and live the expectations they set for the team. This is not nearly as easy as telling the team or writing out goals etc.
Work on your self-awareness, which in turn helps you manage yourself. When you can manage yourself well, then you can work at aligning your decisions, actions and behaviours to the goals and expectations you set. The more alignment you demonstrate, the clearer the goals and expectations to the team.
Publicly praise those meeting the expectations you have set and that you demonstrate. Take corrective action quickly with those that don’t meet the expectations. Use the feedback you provide carefully and intelligently to back up the direction and expectations you set. Consistency is really important to reinforce expectations and direction.
Make the direction and expectations you set your team as clear as possible to create a high performing team.
celebrate the differences to build a high performing team
The brilliant thing about a team is that every person on a team is different. They have different personalities, different backgrounds, different skills & experience, different hopes & dreams, different ideas and approaches to building solutions … It is these differences that make a team great if you can harness them as a manager.
These differences mean you can add two plus two and get six rather than four. Just think about solution building. It is the different ideas, the different approaches, the different experiences alongside good and open debate, challenge and even heated arguments that produce the best solutions to problems. These are the situations that push team members to think harder, to push the boundaries, to be more creative. Encouraging this open and safe culture is vital to build a high performing team.
What To Do
As a manager, some of the concreate actions you can take to celebrate the differences are:
- Lead from the front – so obvious interest in and acceptance of every person in your team. How you behave and what you support will determine what your team does.
- Get to really know your team members – their character, their skills & experience, their strengths and shortcomings, their interests and motivations, their ambitions etc. Then you can match the best person with a given task, problem or project.
- Stay open minded and listen to different, unusual or “silly” ideas and solutions and consider them. Ask questions to get the other person explaining why they have put the idea or solution forward rather than dismiss because the value is not apparent, or it doesn’t align with what you think should work.
- Praise those that have the courage to put their ideas forward or who challenge others providing it is with the genuine aim of improving the outcome
- Take corrective action quickly against any team member that puts others down, tries to silence them or who is aggressive or defensive when challenged for the right reasons.
- Share your ideas, views and solutions last. Ask your team to share their thoughts first.
Think of all the ways you can demonstrate that you appreciate, accept and celebrate all the difference on your team.
The fourth management element to build a high performing team is to work on building a “best work” environment
There is a lot that goes into building what I call a “best work” environment. I am going to focus on two key ones, being
- Encouraging communication
- Creating psychological safety
To build a high performing team, good communication and high levels of psychological safety are definitely required.
Tips on How to Encourage Better Communication
You need communication for better collaboration, for better problem solving, to update team members to improve coordination and when asking for help. A high performing team is usually a fairly noisy team. Expect the hum of voices and discussion.
Here are 7 practical tactics I nearly always employ:
- Ask team members and line managers to meeting for one-on-one each week
- Explain openly and honestly to the team what is happening in the business
- Regularly share updates and news of events that might impact the work of team members
- Encourage team members to keep their stakeholders up to date – i.e. create high visibility of their work
- Provide a lot of feedback diplomatically – positive and corrective and ask for feedback from the team
- Resolve conflicts quickly and collaboratively between team members
- Seek to encourage team members to talk face to face with each other.
Encourage team members to collaborate, to build solutions together and to get help. Good communication is vital to build a high performing team.
Creating Psychological Safety
within your team is also very important so that team members:
- Confidently share their ideas and solutions without fear of put downs or dismissal
- Try new approaches, new solutions, new processes etc knowing that a level of failure for the right reasons is accepted
- Asking for help is encouraged and celebrated rather than used as a sign of weakness. Timely help means tasks are completed quicker and team members learn quicker
- Team members know that when they act for the good of the team and in service of team goals they will be protected and rewarded
- The feeling of safety increases teamwork and relationships across the team
All of these actions build psychological safety which is needed to create a high performing team.
Tips to build psychological safety
- Set really clear goals and expectations. Then team members know exactly what is expected of them
- Be very open, honest and consistent with your team.
- Proactively ask questions and seek team members views, ideals, solutions and help.
- Work hard at managing your reactions, decisions, actions and behaviours so these all align with the expectations you have set.
- Demonstrate that making mistakes is okay. Admit when you make mistakes and be open about some of your failures.
- Encourage team members to challenge, to question and to understand providing it is constructive and in service of the team
- Praise those asking for help quickly and make sure help is delivered just as quickly.
Creating psychological safety within your own team is achieve through how you act and behave as a manager. Make your team feel safe.
In Summary
Building a high performing team is possible with nearly any team. You don’t need lots of stars or highly talented individuals. You do need a lot of teamwork, communication, psychological safety, being there for each other and for you to:
- Be there for your team day in day out, even when it costs you personally
- Set out a really clear team direction and stick to it plus communicate your expectations to your team repeatedly and align your decisions, actions and behaviours with your expectations
- Respect and celebrate the differences between team members and use those differences to increase team performance.
- Work on creating a positive environment that provides safety, challenge, teamwork, collaboration etc.
If you have any questions, please email me at support@enhance.training and I will get back to you
Building a high performing team is a lot more about what you do as a manager, your mindset, your approach to your staff, how you think of them and value them, how you manage your own decisions, actions and behaviours. Having great management skills is bonus that will make your job easier.
Work on your mental approach, your values and your attitude before you work on anything else to increase your team’s performance.
